The Surintendant’s hotel, at St. Mande, was a marvel of art, his library the best in France.  The number and value of his books was urged against him, on his trial, as evidence of his peculations.  His country-seat, at Vaux, cost him eighteen millions of livres.  Three villages were bought and razed to enlarge the grounds.  Le Vau built the chateau.  Le Brun painted the ceilings and panels.  La Fontaine and Michel Gervaise furnished French and Latin mottoes for the allegorical designs.  Le Notre laid out the gardens in the style which may still be seen at Versailles.  Torelli, an Italian engineer, decorated them with artificial cascades and fountains, a wonder of science to Frenchmen in the seventeenth century.  Puget had collected the statues which embellished them.  There was a collection of wild animals, a rare spectacle before the days of zoological gardens,—­an aviary of foreign birds,—­tanks as large as ponds, in which, among other odd fish, swam a sturgeon and a salmon taken in the Seine.  Everything was magnificent, and everything was new,—­so original and so perfect, that Louis XIV., after he had crushed the Surintendant, could find no plans so good and no artists so skilful as these pour embellir son regne.  He was obliged to imitate the man he hated.  Even Fouquet’s men of letters were soon enrolled in the service of the King.

In March, 1661, Mazarin died, full of honor.  His favorite saying, “Il tiempo e un galantuomo,” was fulfilled for him.  In spite of many desperate disappointments and defeats, Messer Tiempo had made him rich, powerful, and triumphant.  The young King, who had already announced his theory of government in the well-known speech, “L’Etat, c’est moi,” waited patiently, and with respect, (filial, some have said,) for the old man to depart.  He put on mourning, a compliment never paid but once before by a French sovereign to the memory of a subject,—­by Henry IV. to Gabrielle d’Estrees.  When the Council came together, the King told them, that hitherto he had permitted the late Cardinal to direct the affairs of State, but that in future he should take the duty upon himself,—­the gentlemen present would aid him with their advice, if he should see fit to ask for it.  It was a “neat little speech,” and very much to the point:  Louis XIV. had the talent of making neat little speeches.  But the Surintendant, who presided in the Council, did not believe him.  A prince, he thought, two-and-twenty years of age, fond of show and of pleasure, of moderate capacity, and with no education, might undertake for a while the cares of government, but, when the novelty wore off, would tire of the labor.  And then, whose pretensions to shoulder the burden were so well founded as Fouquet’s?  He was almost a king, and had the political patronage of a president.  The revenue of the nation passed through his hands. Fermiers and traitants, those who farmed the taxes and those who gathered them for a consideration, obeyed